


The Disease

by Timelady_93



Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: Guns, M/M, Male Slash, Murder, Zombie AU
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-16
Updated: 2015-06-29
Packaged: 2018-03-01 16:34:15
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,933
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2780081
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Timelady_93/pseuds/Timelady_93
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It struck London like a silent fog, except it wasn't a fog.<br/>It struck London like a deadly disease, because that's exactly what it was.<br/>People are feasting on human meat, no matter if it is their boss, their best mate or the love of their life.<br/>Become infected and your life has come to an end. </p><p>A dark-haired man teams up with a young man, with an eye oh so blue...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Zombie AU here I come!  
> This is what I've been writing when I was struck with my writer's block on Volatile.  
> Somehow I wanted to see who would survive the longest in an infected London. 
> 
> Note: This short fic only consists of two chapters, kind of a mind-tickler that I left with an open ending.

Ciel’s head felt heavy. Almost as if he’d been struck over the side of his skull with something hard. He shifted his arms out from under himself and gingerly touched the sore spot. He could feel the thump of his pulse beating inside his head.

 

He groaned, opened his lonely eye to a bleak, dark room and tried to push himself upright. His head was spinning, making him feel slightly nauseous. He looked down on his hands as he sat up. They were caked with dirt, as was his clothes. It looked like he’d been sleeping in them for days. He didn’t understand what had happened. Everything around him was very quiet. He could hear every breath leaving his mouth as he breathed.

 

When he tried to think how he could possibly have been lying on a dirty living room floor, in a seemingly empty house, his mind came up blank. Literally. He knew his name was Ciel, that he was sixteen and that his last name was Phantomhive. After that? Nothing.

 

It didn’t feel like anything else on his body was hurt, so he tried to stand. Failing miserably, he sank down on his knees. His head felt like it was going to burst every time he moved, so he almost crawled towards the open door at the other end of the room. He’d smelt it for a while now, but he couldn’t quite figure out what it was, until he reached the door and grasped the handle to heave himself upright.

 

The handle was red and slippery. Ciel flinched as he realized it was blood. Quickly wiping it off on the nearest rug he could find, he looked around to see if there was anything or anyone that might have been bleeding a few moments ago, that might have touched the handle. Nothing.

 

The hallway he’d entered was empty. He brushed a hand alongside the wall to find a light switch, but when he did find one, it didn’t work. Getting tired of finding no clues whatsoever, he noticed a flight of stairs to his right. As he approached them, he heard a soft creaking noise coming from a floorboard upstairs. He swallowed. What if he actually had been attacked? And what if that person was still in the same house as Ciel was? Upstairs, just waiting to attack again?

 

Ciel reasoned with himself a moment, then he decided to go upstairs anyway. _Slowly and very quietly_ , he thought to himself, taking every step with the outermost caution. The second landing was empty and dark. He could see a few closed doors though, and he headed towards the closest one at hand. He felt how cold sweat trickled down his back as he reached out to grab the handle.

 

With a smooth motion of his wrist, he unlocked the door and it swung open inwards. He peeked into the empty room, containing a bed, a desk and what looked like it might be a wardrobe. The room actually looked pretty clean, compared to what he’d seen so far. A window opposite to the doorway caught his interest and he started walking towards it.

 

Cold steel pressed hard against the nape of his neck. He stopped dead in his tracks. Feeling his pulse going crazy, he tried to focus on his breathing and closed both his eyes. Then a male voice spoke behind him,

 

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?”  


Ciel swallowed, “W-who are you?”

 

The man behind him shoved the barrel harder against Ciel’s neck. “Don’t you dare move.”

 

“But-”

 

“And shut up.”

 

Ciel nodded his wordless answer, which he stopped immediately, because it made his head swim. What if he fainted? What did this man even want with him!

 

The weapon was removed from the nape of his neck and he let out a faint breath of relief. Instead, a large hand grabbed him, and he was forcefully turned around to face his captor. He was scrutinized by a pair of dark eyes, the black hair hanging in greasy locks around the male’s face.

 

Ciel felt a slight pang of fear in his gut. The man before him was lean and tall. To Ciel, it was painfully obvious who would win in a fight. He swallowed again, his throat tight. The man moved his gun away out of sight, slipping it into the lining of his trousers and he grabbed both Ciel’s shoulders hard.

 

“Why are you looking at me like that?”

 

“I might ask you the same question.”

 

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

 

“I don’t know! I can’t remember a thing!” Ciel tried to wriggle himself free, but the grip was too tight.

 

“You can’t remember? Are you fucking kidding me?”

 

“No! And could you please stop swearing? It’s immature.”

 

The black haired man looked at him in shock, and then he schooled his features into a cold mask yet again. Ciel yelped as he was being half dragged, half carried to the window. When he looked outside, he stopped struggling.

 

“Are you seriously telling me you can’t remember this?” The man holding him in a death grip waved his hand towards the scenery, as if to emphasise it further.

 

The younger’s eye widened in shock. It appeared they were somewhere in London, but it was impossible to tell exactly where, the smoke from burning buildings making the air thick and dark. He couldn’t see a single person outside, every street was littered with rubbish, windows on ground floors were bolted shut, and a few cars were parked in the middle of the street as if they’d been suddenly abandoned.

 

He pressed his face closer to the glass, his captor allowing the small movement as he stuttered, “B-but what’s … _how_?”  


The older man yanked him back from the window and spoke calmly,

 

“It all began with a new virus that was resistant against all known medicines.”

 

Ciel clenched his eye shut. “Just…tell me, what’s goin’ on?” When no answer came, he added a quiet “Please?”

 

The older man suddenly let go of his shoulder and his fingers prodded against the younger’s sore skull. They came away stained with red.

 

“You’re bleeding.”

 

Ciel felt panic rise in his chest and he raised both his hands to the back of his head to check for himself.

 

The black haired man sighed, “I must have hit you too hard.” Ciel looked at his bloodstained hands and then he stared with shock at the other man, “You…what?”

 

“I said I must’ve hit you too hard!” He grimaced when he saw the look on the younger’s face, “Yes, yes it was me who knocked you out! I actually thought I’d accidentally killed you.”

 

Ciel’s breath hitched as he tried to think, as he felt a small trickle of something warm and sticky weave its way down his neck. “Do…do I know you?”

 

The older man grabbed him again and turned him around, to face away from him. A ripping noise was heard, then a hand pressed something soft against his head wound rather harshly, making Ciel gasp in pain, a burst of stars dancing in his vision and he felt how his legs gave way beneath himself.

 

In the distance, he heard a voice talking to him, “A bit sore, eh?”

 

When his mind finally came back into place, he found himself being held upright by that black haired man. “It…hurts.”

 

Ciel groaned and allowed him to be dragged across the room towards the bed. When he was pushed down on the soft duvet he realized something, “Hey, what’s your name?”

 

The older man who still held the rag against Ciel’s head to stop the bleeding flinched, but then he simply said, “Sebastian.”

 

Ciel blinked. Nothing in his mind reacted at all. But it did seem as if the man in front of him knew him, because when Ciel opened his mouth and said, “I’m Ciel-” he was cut off by Sebastian who said,

 

“Phantomhive, yes, I know.” Then he eyed him curiously, “If you’ve lost your memory, as you claim, how come you still know your name?”  
  
Ciel swallowed visibly and noisily. He truly didn’t know the answer to that. “I-I don’t know…I can’t…remember anything else…”

 

Sebastian narrowed his eyes a moment, staring the younger down.

 

“You are eighteen and a half years old. We have been a team of sorts for more than a month and a half, trying to survive in this hell on earth. We have not seen another living human being for more than three weeks and four days, the last one we saw, was being eaten alive as we fled.”

 

His voice slowed to a quiet murmur, “We have saved each other’s lives several times over.”

 

Sebastian’s face lost its initial coldness and he looked down at the younger with a small smile tugging at a corner of his lip. His free hand came up for a moment to lightly stroke his knuckles across Ciel’s cheek. The younger looked up at him in confusion as the hand retreated again, only to come to rest firmly placed on the young man’s forehead.

 

Keeping eye-contact with him, he continually increased the pressure on the wound, until, eventually, the bleeding had slowed and became nonexistent.

 

Sebastian tore his eyes away from the teen and withdrew the bloodied rag, his nose crinkled up in obvious disgust. He turned away to dispose of the rag in the small wastebasket in the corner of the room.

 

He threw a glance over his shoulder, making the other shudder at the coldness that had returned in his stare. “If we end up being eaten because you smell like a feast, I’ll kill you,” he hissed, between clenched teeth.

 

Ciel flinched at the harsh words. “So…those…eh, _creatures_ , are they… really…zombies?”

 

Sebastian merely nodded.

 

“Oh. Um, well…It’s not _my_ fault I was bleeding. You just said it was you who hit me! Why did you even do that?”

 

Sebastian glared at him. “Because,” he drawled, “I had just discovered your true self!”

 

Ciel visibly paled beneath his frizzy fringe. “M-my what?”

 

Sebastian’s eyes suddenly held such an immense depth of sorrow, Ciel couldn’t help to stare until the other man averted his gaze. “I…no, sorry, I shouldn’t have said that.”

 

Ciel looked at him with; if possible, even more confusion than earlier and he blurted out, “No, tell me what you meant to say!”

 

Sebastian glared back at him, “I cannot tell you, it does not matter any longer either, since you do no longer recall any of our conversations!”

 

Ciel narrowed his eyes at the other, “How come you’re all well-articulated now, when compared to, what, ten minutes ago you were swearing at me?”

 

Sebastian looked at him as if he wanted to bite his own tongue off. The way his expression changed, he might as well have done just that. Then, a strangled whisper slipped past those pale, bloodless lips, “I hit you…because you wouldn’t agree to sleep with me.”  



	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A gathering of clues and useful things.  
> 2 085 words/ 4 pages

 

Ciel’s head was spinning. He had just realized what Sebastian had said. He had wanted to…to have _sex_ with him. Ciel felt a sudden strike of nausea hitting him; surely, _surely_ he wasn’t gay? Then another thing hit him, Sebastian claimed he was over eighteen. He wasn’t! Or was he?

 

The thick silence after Sebastian’s words clung to them both as if it was trying to suffocate them. He tried to open his mouth to speak, but it was as if his ability to talk had been forgotten as well. He simply stared, dumbfounded, at the handsome man before him. He was staring at a man who wanted to…to… _you-know-what_ and he was sitting on a bed! Ciel felt his face burn at the mere thought.

 

Sebastian chortled at the sight and turned his head away, staring out the grimy window. “There’s no need to be afraid, I won’t take you if you don’t want me.”  

 

Ciel let out a relived sigh he didn’t know he’d been holding in. “Uh, okay.” He rubbed his blushing face in his hands and looked up again, “Thanks.” He wanted to keep the older man talking, he wanted to know more about him, but was afraid to ask. Instead, the room seemed filled to the brim with awkward silence.

 

Ciel took the opportunity to look around the room a little more. There was only one bed, the one he was sitting on, but it was rather large, obviously intended for more than one person. (He couldn’t help but wonder if they’d shared it at one point.) To his left was a wardrobe, one of its doors slightly open, to his right, the door he’d come through and almost completely opposite him, Sebastian and a desk next to the window. The desk was littered with papers and a few pencils. There was no sign of a desk chair. He got up and walked towards it, feeling Sebastian watch him out of the corner of his eye.

 

“What are you doing?” Sebastian, an eyebrow raised, curiously watched the younger sift through the pages and notes on the desk. “You’ve already read all of those.”  
  
Ciel chose to ignore the man and found a piece of paper that looked like it had been torn from a book. He narrowed his eyes and tried to read the small handwriting in the margin. “The anti-dote to the virus is-” Sebastian snatched the paper from Ciel’s hands and held it out of reach to him, dangling it far above the younger’s head. “Hey! Give it back!”  
  
Sebastian sighed, “Ciel…this is a cheat-sheet to a videogame.” He cleared his throat and started to read out loud, “Press Ctrl+shift to open the cheat menu, enter key word D-E-A-D blah, blah, blah, and you will enter the next level with full ammo.” He amusedly watched as Ciel’s expression drooped. “Come on, cheer up.” He dropped the paper and it fluttered slowly to the floor. The younger only glared back at him.  
  
The bluenette started rummaging through his pockets to see if he could find anything to jug his memory back. He found a small pocket-sized knife, a silver coloured key, a few coins and a wristband made out of paracord. He held up the key in front of the window, to try to see it more clearly.

 

Sebastian observed him and pointed a finger at the key in the younger’s hands, “You never told me where that key leads, you know.”

Ciel looked up at the man, who seemed to have calmed down considerably, “I didn’t?”

 

Sebastian shook his head. “Nope. You just said it was very important to you.”

 

The younger kept his gaze steady on the man, “You’re not lying now, are you?”  


“No.” Turning back to the window, he continued, “We’d better pack up and leave, they’re closing in on us.”  
  
Ciel quickly stuffed the key back into his pockets and joined Sebastian by the window, trying to see what the other had meant. After a moment of intense staring, he asked, “How do you know they’re closing in?”

 

“Look.” Sebastian pointed towards a lonely fox, nimbly moving in and out of the piles of rubbish, poking its nose here and there and sniffing the air.  
  
Ciel strained his eyes to see the animal. “So? It’s probably looking for food.”  
  
“It’s only going one way; it’s not backtracking or returning the way it came from. It’s slowly, but carefully fleeing from the advancing creatures.”

 

Ciel couldn’t help but to swallow thickly. “B-but where should we go?”  
  
Without answering, Sebastian walked over to the wardrobe and plucked out two black backpacks. One of them, the slightly smaller one, he threw towards Ciel, who caught it in the air. “Come on Ciel, we should find everything in this house that can come in handy and then we should leave.”

 

\-----

 

When Ciel had rummaged through every nook and cranny in the empty house, he went to the hallway, where Sebastian was waiting for him.

 

“Ready?”

 

Ciel merely nodded as an answer. Then he noticed the large amount of weapons the other man carried. Double handguns on his hips, a large hunting rifle on a strap over his shoulder, a sawed off shotgun alongside the rifle and finally that large, gleaming gun he had pressed to Ciel’s neck. Ignoring the unpleasant flashback, Ciel reached to grab the backpack at Sebastian’s feet. It was filled with all the useful things they had gathered from the house, such as needle and thread, small packets of band-aid and gauze, a roll of fishing line, safety pins and, one of the most important things they had found, a large box of matches. Sebastian was already wearing his bag. Ciel knew it was filled with canned beans and every last bit of food they had. It looked too small on Sebastian’s broad shoulders, far too small to contain food enough for both of them.

 

Feeling a shiver wander down his back, he glanced at the closed door. Sebastian had already reached out to touch the handle. No going back now. He walked up closer to the older man and wondered silently why he hadn’t been allowed anything to defend himself with. Was Sebastian afraid he would turn on him?

 

The door creaked open, the noise too loud in Ciel’s ears. He flinched. The stench that hit them was nauseating. Sebastian pushed the door wide open with his foot, ready to blow the head off of any undead that might ambush them. Nothing. Only the light chill of the evening air and the sweet stench of rotten flesh. Sebastian held his gun with both hands as he looked cautiously outside.

“It’s clear, let’s go.” He kept his gun raised, ready to kill, as they both shuffled out of the abandoned house and out into the deserted street.

 

The street itself looked horrible. Several of the houses Ciel could see had boarded up windows, blood and abandonment in common. Blood. Splattered on the ground, smeared on walls, dried up in black pools in some places. Realizing he’d stopped walking, he hurried to catch up with Sebastian.

 

Ciel didn’t know why, by he felt compelled to whisper the next words, “This…is unreal.”

 

The older man snorted. “Of course it’s unreal; it’s like straight out of a fucking splatter movie.”  
  
They kept walking in silence, every now and then a noise would startle them, make their hearts pound and adrenaline skyrocket. The smell of rotting bodies made Ciel’s stomach twist itself in half and he pressed his sleeve over his mouth and nose to get rid of some of the stench. Sebastian seemed as if he was used to it.

 

After a while Sebastian saw something far ahead and slowed down. At the end of the road, two discarded cars were parked in the middle of the street. The sight made Sebastian grip his gun tighter. An old green station wagon and a red convertible. The latter looked as if it had been the target in a demolition derby.

 

“Ciel, listen up. Where there are cars there may be some useful stuff, but cars seems to attract _them_ , too.”

 

Ciel stared ahead at the seemingly empty street and whispered back, “Okay, what do we do?”

 

Sebastian made a humming noise, and then he pulled out the large gleaming handgun he’d threatened the younger with earlier. He looked at it for a moment, seemingly weighing his options, glanced towards the younger and then he held it out for Ciel to take. “Alright, you should take this.”

 

Ciel felt the heavy piece of shiny metal in his hand. It was warm from Sebastian’s touch. He swallowed hard. “Thanks.”

 

Sebastian ignored him and kept talking, “I’ll go first, you follow right behind me and be prepared to fire at anything that moves, okay?”

 

Ciel nodded. How hard could it be to fire a gun? It was just pointing and pulling the trigger, right? He felt nervous. Sebastian had already started walking so he hurried to cover his back.

 

There was no sound in the street except for their footsteps and their shallow breaths. Ten metres left to the demolished convertible. Smoke was slowly emerging from beneath the bonnet. The other car looked fairly unharmed. The heavy gun felt slippery in his sweaty palms, but Ciel kept it raised and ready to shoot.

 

Sebastian stopped and Ciel bumped into his back. Sebastian grabbed Ciel’s shoulder, “Keep watch, okay?”

 

Ciel nodded and kept his eye on the surroundings as the older man cautiously stepped closer to the cars. No sound, no movement. Only death.

 

A man was still sitting in the driver’s seat of the red convertible. It was obvious he had been dead for days. Sebastian narrowed his eyes. The corpse was strapped down with the seatbelts so if it turned out that the corpse was a zombie, he should be able to get a head start.

 

He poked the dead body with the barrel of his rifle. No movement. He waited, but the corpse remained still. Relaxing a little, he threw a glance towards Ciel, whose arms were shaking with the effort to keep the gun upright and smiled briefly before he returned to examine the cars.

 

He wandered around the convertible and pried open the trunk. He found a thick woollen blanket which he rolled up and placed under his arm as he examined the rest of the car’s contents.

 

A few still sealed bottles of water were a real lucky find, as well as the large bottle of amber whiskey in the gloves compartment. He pressed it all, except the blanket, into his backpack.

 

Holding his rifle ready again, he made his way over to the green station wagon, carefully eyeing his surroundings, prepared to be ambushed. Everything was quiet and calm. Sebastian wandered around the old car, looking for any hints what might have made its owner to abandon it. He chuckled at a stray thought that escaped his mind; _this car looks like something Chevy Chase would drive_. He found nothing wrong with it. The keys were still in the ignition. Lowering his weapon, he reached out and opened the driver’s door. No lurking zombies jumped out.

 

The car was impeccably clean and empty, except for something hidden beneath a black plastic sheet in the trunk, visible trough the car’s windows. He called for Ciel as he snatched the car keys and walked around to inspect the trunk too. When Ciel came up beside him, he stopped and stared, when Sebastian lifted the black plastic. Jerry cans. Ten, maybe twelve of them. Sebastian tried to lift one of them and it was heavy. Excited, he threw off the plastic and proceeded to lift, open and sniff the contents as he counted a total of twelve of them. This was his lucky day!

 

He hurried over to the driver’s seat with keys in hand. He turned the ignition. A low rumble was heard as the car came to life. Sebastian jumped out and returned to the trunk, hauled all his loot inside, motioned to Ciel to do the same and he covered it all with the black plastic again. Sebastian returned to the wheel and Ciel climbed in beside him. The car purred when Sebastian put the automatic into drive. They had a car, fuel and water. Beans would have to do for a while, but now, Sebastian was finally optimistic about the future. He reached out and grabbed Ciel’s hand. The younger was still holding the gun.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Anyone still interested in this?


End file.
